


Facing It

by narglesabound



Category: Outer Banks (TV)
Genre: Abusive Parents, F/M, Friendship, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, pogues macking on other pogues
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-05-05
Updated: 2020-06-25
Packaged: 2021-03-02 22:35:01
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 4,388
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24014536
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/narglesabound/pseuds/narglesabound
Summary: JJ was supposed to show up at the boneyard and is nowhere to be found. Kie goes looking, and doesn't like what she finds.Just another story about JJ & Kiara's incredible chemistry that also gives the most precious man in the OBX a desperately needed hug.
Relationships: JJ & Kiara (Outer Banks), JJ/Kiara (Outer Banks)
Comments: 37
Kudos: 346





	1. Chapter 1

He was supposed to meet them at the boneyard. It was a hot Friday in July. Tourons with their frat straps and bad sunburns were swarming. And some of their pogue friends had scraped together enough money for not one, but two kegs. A real dream of an evening. Kiara was surveying the scene from her driftwood perch, second beer in hand, when she actually processed that JJ should have shown up by now. They’d split that afternoon after an excellent day of doing absolutely nothing out on the water, dropping John B and JJ off at the chateau with instructions to please take a shower before the party. 

“I am trying to get you laid here, and I cannot wing woman two boys who smell like drum guts. Even I’m not that good”, Kiara had told them. 

JJ had winked and told her, “Don’t worry mama, I’ll clean up nice for you”. 

So why, four hours later, was John B already halfway down the beach with some blonde from Kansas and JJ nowhere to be found? She shoved herself off the log and dusted sand off her ass before winding through the crowd to find Pope. He was, unsurprisingly, with a few of his nerdy friends, discussing how long it would take a body to decompose in the marsh and totally ignoring the two cute touron girls obviously checking him out. Pope was oblivious, even for a boy.

She hip checked him hard enough to slosh a little beer out of his cup, “Yo. You know what happened to JJ?”

He looked up, confused and drunker than she’d realized, and said, “Nah. John B said he showered at the chateau and then went to get something from his house. Said he told him he’d meet us here. Is he not here?”

Kie furrowed her eyebrows. That didn’t feel right, “No, he’s not here. And by the way, if you’d quit giving your little anthropology lecture for a minute you might notice the two girls by the keg who’ve been staring at you and giggling for the last 10 minutes.”, she raised her eyebrows and nodded toward the pair. 

“Oh shit. Yep. Yes, I will put a pause on this and go talk to them immediately. I’ll just get some beers, walk over all cool, and then – “, he was still stammering to himself when she walked away. 

“Do not talk to them about corpses Pope. I will kill you”, she called over her shoulder. 

Kiara walked slowly around the edges of the party, trying to figure out what to do. Pope said JJ had gone home to get something, and JJ going home was always a dangerous affair. The pogues didn’t really talk about it, and that had always made her mad. She’d tried, in the beginning, to ask about every bruise, to tell JJ that he didn’t deserve this every time he winced when he sat down. She soon learned that just ended with a pissed off, distant JJ and the other two boys looking at her like “what can you do?”

That was the first time she really felt the distance between her and the rest of the pogues, really learned what money meant, aside from fancy clothes she didn’t want and prejudices she refused to buy into. It meant options, and safety, and not having to shrug and accept a father who beat you because that was better than a foster parent who might do worse, and take you away from your friends to boot. 

Downing her beer, Kie took off down the beach toward the chateau. She didn’t drive after drinking, even just a little, and she could tell she wasn’t going to enjoy the rest of the party with this worry in the back of her mind. Might as well go for a long walk and see if JJ had turned up. It was just to ease her worries, and because the party wasn’t really that fun anyway, she told herself. Definitely not because the thought of time alone with JJ was more exciting than it had any right to be, or because she worried over him a little more than a friend should. She’d have done the same for the other two boys. Of course she would.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I apologize that this chapter is mostly Kie's reminiscing and does not yet give you the JJ fix-it I KNOW you're here for. Except I'm not sorry because it gives us the reunion scene we all needed.

The way home was dark and buggy. As she swatted at what she assumed was yet another mosquito, Kiara wished – probably for the thousandth time – that her friends could afford data plans or at least home wifi. It was 2020 and they were still carefully arranging meeting times and knocking on each other’s doors unannounced like they were a bunch of Gen-X latchkey kids. It was kind of cool in a retro way, but mainly it was a huge pain in the ass. 

She could have had friends with unlimited data, unlimited budgets, and no part-time jobs taking up their schedules, if she were willing to compromise her standards for friends that is. Despite what she’d told the pogues, she fit in fine at the Kook Academy that year, until she decided she didn’t want to. She’d made an honest go of it, really she had, but she considered the Great Birthday Party Fiasco the Universe’s way of telling her she had strayed too far from who she really was. 

The Sunday after that disaster had been a big storm on the island. She’d told her parents she was feeling sad about her clearly wrecked social life and just wanted to go for a drive to clear her head. After listening to the angry crashing upstairs all day as Kiara had boxed up dresses and thrown away makeup bottles, they easily agreed. They didn’t know her board was still on top of her car, or that she was more interested in reconnecting with her true, wild-at-heart self than crying to Lana Del Ray on the backroads of Kildare County. 

She had just ridden her first big wave and let out a whoop of freedom to the stormy sky, when she saw them. Two boys paddling out into the angry surf, and a third on the shore, looking into the ocean with his arms crossed like he’d rather be anywhere else. She’d have recognized them anywhere – Pope’s straight back, John B’s tanned shoulders, and JJs hair – bright blonde, even soaking wet. 

There was no way they wouldn’t see her. They had known her too, not so long ago, even if they’d tried to forget her after the disappearing act she’d pulled. She looked to the sky for guidance, tucked her board under her arm, and started toward them. By the time she got close, JJ and John B were on the backend of a wave, almost back to shore. Pope had turned away from the waves and was looking at her like she’d lost her mind. 

“I fucked up,” she called to all three of them. “I fucked up and I’m sorry. Can I please come back?” 

They’d forgiven her one at a time. JJ first, because of the boobs, she assumed. His hatred of discord among pogues might have had something to do with it too. Then Pope, reluctant but logical, had determined she was serious about her repentance and, besides, she brought some much needed brains and free food to the operation. And finally, John B had given in. She’d let out one short sob of relief the day he put an arm around her in the chateau kitchen and said, “I’m glad you came back”. 

Kiara Carrera, one-time number two in the pecking order at the Kook Academy, had once again come to be mother hen and muse to three boys from the Cut. She loved them in the gritty, noble way you love people you chose against some folks’ better judgement, and that you know might need you a little more than you need them. She’d always known they all three were a little bit in love with her. She didn’t mind. If she was honest, she was a little in love with all three of them too. 

Kie shook her head as she turned down the familiar street. Right now, one of those boys she loved was MIA, and she had a sinking feeling it wasn’t for an innocent reason. She tried not to think about all the fingerprint bruises and busted lips she’d tried not to stare at, or the bad times when JJ wouldn’t even take his shirt off on the boat. 

Once she got close enough, Kiara could see lights on inside the chateau, but that didn’t mean much. John B wasn’t exactly concerned with saving the environment, despite all the emotional labor Kie put into educating him. Besides, his uncle was at least good for paying the electric bill, and lights might keep away a burglar or two. So Kie wasn’t expecting anything in particular when she stepped up to the screened-in porch and wiggled open the door, always unlocked but swollen from the humid weather. 

She had her thumb hooked into one backpack strap and was about to sit the bag down to dig out her key to the actual house when she sensed she wasn’t alone. She felt her heart race and then her stomach sink as she looked to her right. There was JJ, slumped into the corner of the couch and, even in the half dark, she could tell this time it had been really, really bad.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Finally! Well, kind of.

“Oh fuck, JJ,” she breathed.

His less swollen eye cracked open and a shadow of the signature smirk appeared. “Hey, Kie. How was the party?” 

“Not relevant. What the fuck happened to you?” she said, putting one knee on the couch and leaning in to get a better look at his face.

“Oh, you know, just ran into the wrong side of my dad’s fist a couple dozen times. You know how clumsy I can be.” She could hear the bitterness under the bravado in his voice, and it made her heart beat faster in anger.

He was still looking at her with one unblinking blue eye, waiting for her to react.

In the moonlight coming through the screen windows she could already see that the other eye was swollen shut, and there was crusted blood all over his nose and mouth, and what looked like more blood running down from one ear. Kiara also knew from years of paying close attention while pretending not to that the worst of JJs injuries were usually in places clothes would hide.

She closed her eyes and took a quick breath, going into crisis mode. “Alright, come on, we gotta get you in the house,” she said in a voice far more sure than she felt. She leaned down and gently gripped his upper arms. When he didn’t flinch, she took a step back and pulled him to his feet.

He stumbled a bit and steadied himself by grabbing her waist, right at the gap between tank top and shorts. They stood still there in the dark, just for a breath. She wanted to say something, squeeze him tight enough to her to stop the ache in her chest, but she was afraid of the damage that might do, physical or otherwise.

Breaking whatever strange spell had momentarily overcome them, Kie bent and dug her key from the dropped backpack and finagled them both through the door and into the familiar messiness of the chateau’s living room.

JJ was uncharacteristically quiet as she guided him through the house to John B’s bathroom and began digging through the cabinets for first aid supplies.

“Here, sit down so you can rest while I clean you up”, Kie said quietly, gesturing to the closed toilet lid.

JJ’s lip curled and he looked up to the ceiling, “I don’t exactly want to sit down right now, Kie.”

He looked back at her with a bitter smirk and a tinge of shame on his cheeks.

“Shit JJ, I’m so-“ she started, but he kept talking, tone angry now.

“You know, I think he just felt like embarrassing me at first. I went back to get some stuff for the party. Thought I could contribute something for once. He caught me ‘stealing’ vodka, even though he bought it with money I made to support his useless ass. Said if I was going to act like a little kid he was going to whip me like one,” JJ shrugged and looked resigned,

“I figured I’d bend over and take it like a little bitch and then get outta there and have a good night. But once he got started I guess he found shit to be mad at me for that a belt wouldn’t quite cover. I am an infuriating bastard like that.”

There were tears in his eyes when he finished, and he was looking at her with raised eyebrows, as if challenging her to argue with him. Over what, she didn’t know.

“You’re not –” she started, unsure of how to say this in a way he wouldn’t totally brush off.

“Well, you are infuriating as hell, Maybank, but that’s why I….” she trailed off, and then spoke again with more conviction,

“You’ve never done anything to deserve to be hurt like this, JJ. I can promise you that.” She said the last part looking so fiercely at him that a lesser man might have turned away.

But it was Kie who broke the trance and turned back to the rubbing alcohol and cotton pads on the counter. She knew he wasn’t going to like it, but she wasn’t stupid enough to believe he could be convinced to go to a hospital, and she sure as hell wasn’t going to have him getting tetanus or something on her watch.

She avoided his eyes, afraid of what she might see there, and gently rested one hand on the side of his neck as she cleaned the blood from his face.

He hissed in pain, which she met with quiet teasing. “Oh you big baby, JJ,” she chided,

“Don’t be a little kook princess, it’s just some alcohol,” but her thumb rubbing gently back and forth on his neck let him know there was no heat behind it.

When ointment had been gently dabbed on all the places skin was broken, and gauze secured with ACE bandages around both sets of knuckles, Kie sighed and looked up to where JJ had his head leaned back against the wall, eyes closed.

She could’ve kissed him then, in the fluorescent bathroom lighting, the silence heavy between them. She wanted to, got far enough to imagine what the Neosporin-greased, still-not-scabbed-over split in his bottom lip would feel like pressed against hers.

But how many times had she lectured the boys about how someone in a compromised state, whether physical or emotional, couldn’t consent? It would be wrong to take advantage by making a move now. Or maybe she was just a coward.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fear not - I already have the next chapter mostly written, since it's a continuation of this scene. 
> 
> If you have things you want to see here, let me know. I really love writing these two, so can always make some new fics for things that don't fit in this story.


	4. Chapter 4

His eyes were still closed, unaware of what she’d just almost done. His head was tipped back against the wall where he’d rested it while she cleaned his busted knuckles. Despite the posture, she could tell he was still wound tight as a spring, lips pressed together, those two wrinkles between his eyebrows he always got when he was thinking too much.

Kie thought it was funny that JJ, the least innocent of them all, looked the youngest. He moved through the world like a little boy, all energy and skinned knees and distraction, never staying still long enough for anyone to look too closely.

And now here he was, still and quiet in the aftermath of something she couldn’t even fathom. She felt her throat tighten looking at him. God, JJ Maybank. When did he turn into the star her whole sky turned around?

Instead of answering that question, she armored back up and popped her lips, causing him to jump a little and look at her again.

“I know that’s not all of it.”

He tensed immediately and looked away.

“Kie, it’s fine. You’ve done plenty. Not like you can do anything to fix it, and it’s really not that bad. I just wanna take some Advil and sleep for a year.”

“I know,” she spoke slowly, softer than she had all night, “Soon. But we at least need to clean everything and make sure you don’t have cracked ribs. Come on. It’ll take five minutes, tops,” she reached for the hem of his shirt and tugged a little.

“If you wanted to take my clothes off, Kie, you could have just asked,” he could only manage a tired half smile, but the tension in her chest eased a little.

“Here I am, asking you to take your clothes off JJ, fulfilling all your wildest dreams. Now strip.”

The sarcasm felt forced, considering the pile of bloody cotton in the trash can, but who was she to deny them a little normalcy?

She ended up helping him, carefully gathering the stained t-shirt up around his rib cage and easing it over his head and down his arms, exposing more and more sharp, U-shaped bruises as she went. Fucking hell. He had walked here?

“Jesus, JJ,” she said quietly, letting his shirt drop to the floor.

“Impressive, I know.”

She kept her eyes on his tanned chest, unable to look up at him just then. He gave a quiet 'yes' when she asked if she could check to see if anything was cracked. With feather light fingers, she worked her way from his waist all the way up, hating herself for pressing on his bruises, wincing every time he made a sound of pain.

She’d learned how to do this from Sarah Cameron, actually. Once upon a time in the princess’s en suite bathroom, a crying Sarah had told Kie exactly what to do, and Kie had nervously pressed on each of the other girl’s ribs as instructed, watching her reactions and feeling for movement. That nightmare had been brought to them courtesy of the boy before Topper, a specimen of kook garbage who happened to also be a close family friend of the Camerons. He’d gone to college not long after, and Sarah had only ever told Kie.

Once she was satisfied nothing was going to puncture a lung, her eyes flicked to the red marks she could see wrapping around his rib cage from the back. Taking a deep breath, she lightly gripped his shoulders and felt him tense before relenting and turning his back to her.

Kiara froze, mouth falling open of its own accord. Red and purpling welts criss-crossed almost all of JJ’s back, some of them split and bleeding a little at the edges. In among the mess were darker, curved marks that Kie sickeningly realized could only be from a belt buckle.

“Kie, it’s fine. I promise. Nothing that hasn’t happened before.” His voice was tight, controlled.

She met his eyes in the bathroom mirror, and that look – of a scared, angry kid barely hidden under a man trying to protect his friend from worry – made her lose it. 

“I’m so…I’m so sorry, JJ.” Her voice cracked, curls tossed as she shook her head vehemently.

“No, I’m sorry. I just meant to come back and crash on the porch until someone got back and then come in and go to bed. You shouldn’t have to deal with this,” he turned to face her.

“JJ – “

“It’s my own fault anyway. Shouldn’t have stolen his vodka. I know better at this point,”

“JJ - ”

“Just go roll us a blunt Kie. I’ll dump peroxide on this and be out there in a minute.”

“JJ stop!” she put her hands on his shoulders, desperate. 

“Look I know you don’t like talking about what happens with your dad, or letting people take care of you, or talking about your feelings. But you just got the ever living shit beaten out of you, and I am your friend, and I’m not going anywhere, so here’s what’s gonna happen: I'm going to finish cleaning you up, and you're going to let me, and then we are going to eat cold pizza, smoke a fat blunt, and sleep, and then tomorrow we are going to talk about this and not avoid it like we always do. You got me?”

He just looked at her for a second, wavering, and then his arms went around her tight, face gingerly pressed into her neck, breath shaking with tears. 

“Okay. Okay. I’m just so tired. I can’t do it anymore.”

“I know baby. I know.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Threw some fun Sarah Cameron background in here. I think, time-wise, this is all set post- Kiara's Kook year, but pre-show. Alternately it could be an AU where there is no treasure hunt. Imagine it how you will. 
> 
> Let me know what y'all think! This is my first multi-chapter (and 3rd fic ever), so comments are v appreciated.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We are moving to present tense writing because...my brain wanted to.

They might stay like that for seconds or half an hour – his face buried in her neck, body heavy against her, her leaning back into the bathroom counter so she can take more of his weight. 

His breath is shuddering and shaky, and she can feel tears dripping down her chest, but he still won’t let go and let himself cry. His hands fist tight into her shirt as he grits out what a fuckup he is, how he never asked for such a shitty life, and doesn’t want this one anymore. 

His voice is as vulnerable as she’s ever heard it, except maybe first thing in the morning when he wakes up at the chateau and doesn’t know where or when he is. She tips her head back to look at the ceiling as if there might be answers up there, running her fingers through that soft blonde hair over and over. 

JJ had never been one for physical affection with anyone other than John B. A trust thing, she assumed, though they all just chalked it up to the bromance. JJ would jump into John B’s arms without hesitation, ruffle his hair, put a teasing hand to his face. They shared a level of affection you didn’t normally see between straight male friends.

In sharp contrast, the most he’d ever really touched Kie was to help her onto the boat or twirl her around if she pouted enough to get him to dance with her. Thinking about it now, Kie realized that John B was likely JJs solution to the fact that, given his home life, physical touch was fraught with fear, but he still needed it.

Now here he is, willingly letting her touch and soothe and patch him up. She knows it’s mostly the desperate nature of the situation, but the thought that she might have somehow earned his trust makes something warm and bright glow in her chest. 

When he tells her that he thought he might not make it out of there tonight, and that this hadn’t been the first time he thought he might die, that’s when he finally loses it.  
Between sobs he’s still making a valiant effort of holding back, he tells her stories that confirm the worst fears she’s had since knowing him. 

He tells her about concussions, falling asleep unsure if he’d be able to wake up. Tells her about how often he’s looked down the wrong end of a gun, not knowing if today would be the day his father pulled the trigger – by accident or not didn’t really matter.

No wonder he was so desperate to have a weapon of his own. 

Finally, he calms, and that’s almost worse. His breath is hot and moist on the side of her neck. 

“I don’t…I don’t wanna die, Kie.” His voice is muffled, but he says it with defiance, and it strangely comforts her, to hear him confirm that he wants to be here, awful as the world has been to him. She can’t say with certainty that she’d feel the same. 

When she swallows, but doesn’t respond, he lifts his head to look at her, eyes wild and desperate. They’re still pressed together from the waist down, and her left hand is still tangled in his hair, right by his temple. It’s like the universe pauses all its spinning and waits to see what they’ll do. She leans forward and kisses him before she’s had a conscious thought. 

It’s as gentle as can be, though he still flinches in pain or surprise when her lips touch his. She’s barely registered the warmth of his mouth when panic strikes. She pulls back, heart racing, and he’s looking at her in shock. She stares back at him and presses her lips together, feeling the grease from the ointment she’d dabbed on his split lip not twenty minutes before. 

“You are not going to die until you are very old and very happy,” her throat gets tight as she says it, and oh God she’s going to cry. 

“I promise, okay? You die and I will kill you. I need you here,” 

She is crying now, so it’s through blurred vision that she sees his face moving toward her. 

He kisses like she always imagined, and she’s definitely imagined it. He’s all teeth and a little tongue and more intensity than she’s ever had turned on her before. 

It isn’t pretty. They both taste like salt, and she thinks his split lip might have reopened. His hands are still white knuckled in the back of her tank top, and he’s pressed against her so hard that she’s sure to have a bruise from the hard edge of the countertop. 

When they pull back, it’s because both of them are crying. He presses his forehead hard against hers and exhales shakily, and she can’t help but laugh. 

“We’re such a fucking mess,” 

“Yeah, this is not how I pictured it,” 

“You pictured this,” she pulls back to look at him. 

He gives her an incredulous face, “You are arbitrarily super fucking hot. And I’ve been hanging out with you in a swimsuit for the past two years. What do you think?” 

She rolls her eyes and looks away, “Not what I meant, JJ.” 

“Yeah I know,” he says quietly. He waits until she looks at him again to wink. 

She thinks they understand each other, thinks maybe all of the desperation she felt in that kiss wasn’t just about the situation or his life in general, that some of if might really have been for her. Yet another problem to face tomorrow. 

Kie shoves at his shoulders, forcing him to stand straight again, “Off. I need weed.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I can't decide if I want this to be the smooshiest H/C, or if I want smut. *shrugs*

**Author's Note:**

> Working on the next chapter. Comments and love appreciated.


End file.
